The homestead rested upon the southern slope of a wood-crowned hill, which was merely one of a swarm of hills of lesser or greater magnitude. Westward, away in the distance, the silver sheen of the main mountain range still continued to reflect the rainbow tints of a radiant sunset.
It was a homestead to associate with hands less than 'prentice. There was neither imagination nor very definite purpose in its planning. It rather gave the impression of the driving of sheer necessity than the enthusiasm of effort toward the achievement of a heartily conceived purpose. Furthermore, it bore evident signs of a desire to escape as far as possible the burdens of the life it represented.
The squalid two-roomed house was sunk into the backing to the sloping hill. Its front and sides were of green logs and a mud plaster. Its roof was of a primitive thatch, held secure from winter storms by sapling logs lashed fast across it. The central doorway was filled by a rough-boarded door, and the apertures left for added light were covered with thin cotton material. They were left wide open in summer, and in winter only served to shut out the worst of the driven snows and most of the daylight.
The adjacent barn was of far greater extent, but of considerably less degree. Still, it was sufficiently weather-proof, which was all that could be reasonably hoped for by the toughened creatures, who found shelter beneath its crazy roof. Higher up the slope stood a couple of corrals of sorts. Their position was at the southern extremity of the woodland crown, their placing probably inspired by the adjacency of the material required for their construction.
Below the house stretched a sloping patch of growing wheat, perhaps about thirty acres in extent. This was the real business of the homestead, and, in spite of the crazy fencing of barbed wire about it, it looked to be richly flourishing.
For all the general ineffectiveness of the place, however, it was not without significance. For it gave that human touch which at once breaks up the overpowering sensation which never fails to depress in the silent heart of Nature's immensity. It spoke of courage, too. The reckless courage of early youth, plunging for the first time into independence. Furthermore, it suggested something of the first great sacrifice which the hot tide of love, surging through youthful veins, is prepared to make for the object of its passionate regard. In any case it symbolized the irresistible progress of man's effort when pitted against the passive resistance of Nature's most fiercely rugged frontiers.
A wonderful harmonious peace reigned over the scene which was bathed in the light of a drooping sun. It was the chastened pastoral peace, than which there is no more perfect in the world. Cattle were grazing their way homeward; the cows bearing their burden of laden udders to yield it for the benefit and prosperity of the community; the steers lingering at the banks of the murmuring mountain stream, or standing knee-deep in its waters, their sleek sides sheathed in rolls of fat, only waiting to yield up their humble lives as their contribution to the insatiable demands of the dominant race.
Two or three horses stood adjacent to the doorway of the humble barn, patiently flickering their long, unkempt tails in a vain effort to ward off the attacks of swarming flies. A few chickens moved about drowsily, just outside the hutch which had been contrived for their nightly shelter. While stretched upon the dusty earth, side by side, lay two great rough-coated dogs slumbering their hours of watch and ward away in the shade, with the indifference of creatures whose vain hopes of battle have been all too long deferred.
All of a sudden there came a partial awakening.
Out of the west, down the slope of a neighboring hill came a figure on horseback. It was moving at a rapid gallop. The horses at the barn turned about and raised their heads watchfully. They whinnied at the approach. The two dogs were on their feet startled into alertness, vain hope rising once more in their fierce hearts. The hens cackled fussily at the prospect of their deferred evening meal. The last of the cattle ambled heavily from the water's edge. It was rather like the obscure movement of a mainspring, setting into motion even the remotest wheel of a mechanism.
Effie galloped up to the house. Nothing of the gentle waking her coming had inspired attracted her observation. Her handsome eyes were preoccupied, and their gaze wandered back over the way she had come, searching the distance with the minutest care. Finally she dismounted and off-saddled, turning her pony loose to follow the promptings of its own particular requirements. Then she set about releasing the carcase of the deer upon her saddle, and bore it away to a lean-to shed at the side of the house. Emerging therefrom she picked up her saddle and bridle and took them into the house. Then she took up her stand within the doorway and, once more, narrowly searched the surrounding hills with eyes as eager and doubtful as they were beautiful.
The calm of evening had settled once more upon the place. The peace of it all was superlative. It was peace to which Effie was something more than averse. She dreaded it. For all her two years of life in the meagre home her husband had provided her with, it required all her courage and fortitude to endure it. The hills haunted and oppressed her, and her only hope lay in the active prosecution of her work.
She breathed a profound sigh. There was relief in the expression of her face. The drooping corners of her mouth and the tight compression of her well-formed lips told their own story of her emotions. She had passed through an anxious time, and only now was she beginning to feel reassured.
Yes. All was well, she believed. She had lost her pursuers, thanks to the staunchness of her pony, and her knowledge of the country about her. With another sigh, but this time one of weariness, she left her doorway and moved over to the barn. There was still the dreary round of "chores" to which her life seemed dedicated.
* * * * * *
A solitary horseman sat gazing out through a leafy barrier across the narrow valley of the little mountain stream. His eyes were fixed upon the dejected homestead on the slope of the hill beyond. He was be-chapped, and carried the usual complement of weapons at his waist. His horse was an unusually fine creature, and well up to the burden it was called upon to bear. Nor was that burden a light one, for the man was both massive and muscular.
The watchful eyes were deep set in a mahogany-hued setting. It was a hard face, brutal, and the eyes were narrow and cruel.
For a long time he sat there regarding the homestead. He beheld the graceful form of the woman as she moved swiftly about her work. Judging from his expression, which was by no means pleasant, two emotions were struggling for dominance. For some time doubt held chief place, but slowly it yielded to some more animal emotion. Furthermore temptation was urging him, and more than once he lifted his reins, which became a sign of yielding.
But all these emotions finally passed. It was evident that some even stronger force was really governing him. For, with a sharp ejaculation that conveyed every feeling suggested by disappointment, he swung his horse about and galloped off in a southeasterly direction—toward Orrville.
* * * * * *
It was past midnight. Effie, flushed with an unusual excitement, was gazing up into her husband's face. She was listening almost breathlessly to the story he was telling her. The little living-room, more than half kitchen, was bathed in the yellow light of a small tin kerosene lamp. For the time at least her surroundings, the poverty and drudgery of her life, were forgotten in the absorbing feelings consuming her.
"I tell you, Effie, I was scared—plumb scared when I saw what it was," Bob Whitstone ended up. "Guess we've known long enough the whole blamed countryside is haunted by cattle rustlers, but—that's the first time I've seen 'em, and I guess it's the first time any one's seen 'em at work. Say, I'm not yearning for the experience again."
But Effie had no interest beyond his story. His feelings on the matter of his experience were of no concern whatever at the moment. There were other things in her mind, things of far greater import. She returned to the rocker chair, which was the luxury of their home, and sat down. There was one thing only in Bob's story which mattered to her just now.
"Ten thousand dollars," she murmured. "Ten thousand! It's a—fortune."
Bob moved across to a rough shelf nailed upon the wall and picked up a pipe.
"A bit limited," he observed contemptuously, as poured some tobacco dust into the bowl.
"I was thinking of—ourselves."
The man ceased his operation to gaze swiftly down upon the gently swaying figure in the chair.
"What d'you mean, Effie?" he demanded sharply.
The girl's steady eyes were slowly raised in answer to the challenging tone. They met her husband's without a shadow of hesitation.
"It sounds like a fortune to me, who have not handled a dollar that I could spend without careful thought—for two years," she declared with warmth.
Bob completed the filling of his pipe. He did not answer for a few moments, but occupied himself by lighting it with a reeking sulphur match.
"That's a pretty hard remark," he said at last, emitting heavy clouds of smoke between his words.
"Is it? But—it's just plain facts."
"I s'pose it is."
The girl had permitted her gaze to wander. It passed from her husband's face to the deplorable surroundings which she had almost grown accustomed to, but which now stood out in her mind with an added sense of hopelessness. The lime-wash over the cracked and broken plaster which filled the gaps between the logs of the walls. The miserable furnishing, much of it of purely home manufacture, thrown up into hideous relief by the few tasteful knickknacks which had been wedding presents from her intimate friends and relatives in the east. The earthen floor, beaten hard and kept scrupulously swept by her own hands. The cook-stove in the corner, with its ill-set stovepipe passing out of a hole in the wall which had been crudely covered with tin to keep out the draughts in winter. The drooping ceiling of cotton material, which sagged in great billows under the thatch of the roof. It was all deplorable to a woman who had known the comfort of an almost luxurious girlhood. Into her eyes crept a curious light. It was half resentful, half triumphant. It was wholly absorbed.
"Suppose? There's no supposition," she cried bitterly. "I have had the experience of it all, the grind. Maybe you don't know what it is to a woman, a girl, to find herself cut off suddenly from all the little luxuries she has always been used to. I don't mean extravagances. Just the trifling refinements which count for so much in a young woman's life. The position is possible, so long as the hope remains of their return later, perhaps fourfold. But when that hope no longer exists—I guess there's nothing much else that's worth while."
The man continued to smoke on for some silent moments. Then, as the girl, too, remained silent, he glanced at her out of the corners of his eyes.
"You gave up a good deal for me—for this," he said in gentle protest. "But you did it with your eyes open—I mean, to the true facts of my position. Say, Effie, I didn't hold you up for this thing. I laid every card on the table. My father threatened us both, to our faces, if we persisted in marrying. Well, I guess we persisted, and he—why, he just handed us what he promised—the dollars that bought us this—farm. That was all. It was the last cent he figured to pass our way. You know all that, and you never squealed—then. You knew what was in store. I mean—this." He flung out one arm in a comprehensive gesture. "You guessed you'd grit enough to face it—with me. We hoped to win out." Then he smiled. "Say, I guess I haven't given up a thing—for you, eh? I haven't quit the home of millionaire father where my year's pocket money was more than the income of seventy per cent. of other folks! I, too, did it for this—and you. Won't you stick it for me?"
The man's appeal was spoken in low earnest tones His eyes were gentle. But the girl kept hers studiously turned from his direction, and it was impossible for him to read that which lay behind them.
Again some silent moments passed. The girl was gently rocking herself. At last, however, she drew in her feet in a nervous, purposeful movement, and sat forward.
"Bob," she exclaimed, and now there were earnestness and kindness in the eyes that gazed up at the man, "it's no use for us to talk this way," she cried. "I began it, and I ought to be sorry—real sorry. But I'm not. I wouldn't have acted that way under ordinary circumstances. But it's different now, and it was your own talk made me. You sneered at that ten thousand dollars, which seems to be a fortune to me. Ten thousand dollars!" she breathed. "And we haven't ten dollars between us in this—house. Bob, it makes me mad when I think of it. You don't care. You don't worry. All yon care for is to get away from it all—from me—and spend your time among the boys in Orrville. You've been away ever since dinner to-day, and now it's past midnight. Why? Why, when there's a hundred and one things to do around this wretched shanty? No—you undertake this thing, and then—spend every moment you can steal—yes, that's the word—steal, hanging around Ju Penrose's saloon. I'm left to fix things right here—to do the work which you have undertaken. Then you sneer when I see a fortune in that ten thousand dollars reward."
The girl's swift heat was not without effect. She had not intended to accuse in so straight a fashion. It was the result of long pent-up bitterness, which never needs more than a careless word to hurl into active expression. Bob's mild expression of contempt looked to be about to cost him dear.
A moody look not untouched with some sort of fear had crept into the man's eyes. Now he tried to smooth the threat of storm he saw looming. Furthermore, an uncomfortable feeling of his own guilt was possessing him.
"But what if it can be called a fortune, Effie?" he demanded swiftly."It don't concern us. I don't guess it's liable to come our way."
"Why not?"
The girl's challenge came short and sharp, and her beautiful eyes were turned upon him full of cold regard.
The man was startled. He was even shocked.
"How?" he demanded. "I don't get you."
The girl sprang from her chair in a movement of sup-pressed excitement. She came toward him, her eyes shining. A glorious ruddy tint shone through the tanning of her fair cheeks. She was good to look at, and Bob felt the influence of her beauty at that moment just as he had felt it when, for her, he had first flung every worldly consideration to the four winds.
"Will you listen, Bob? Will you listen to me while I tell you all that's been churning around in my head ever since you told me of that reward? You must. You shall. I have lived through a sort of purgatory in these hills for too long not to make my voice heard now—now when there's a chance of making our lives more tolerable. Oh, I've had a day while you've been away. It's been a day such as in my craziest moments I've never even dreamed of. Bob, I've discovered what they've all been trying to discover for years. I've found Lightfoot's camp!"
"And then?"
The girl's enthusiasm left her husband caught in a wave of apprehension. He saw with a growing sense of horror the meaning of that sudden revolt. This was displayed in his manner. Nor was Effie unobservant of it. Nor unresentful.
She shrugged her perfect shoulders with assumed unconcern.
"That reward—those ten thousand dollars are mine—ours—if I choose.And—I do choose."
There was no mistaking the firmness, the decision in her final words. They came deliberate and hard, and they roused the man to prompt and sharp denial.
"You—do—not."
He was no longer propped against the table. He was no longer gentle. He stood erect and angry, and their regard was eye to eye. But even so there was no disputing the woman's dominance of personality. The man's eyes, for all their anger, conveyed not a tithe of the other's decision. His whole attitude was subjective to the poise of the woman's beautiful head, her erect, sculptured shoulders. Her measuring eyes were full of a fine revolt. There was nothing comparable between them—except their anger.
"Who can stop me? You?"
The scornful challenge rang sharply through the little room. Then a silence fraught with intense moment followed upon its heels.
The man nodded. His movement was followed by Effie's mocking laugh.
Perhaps Bob realized the uselessness, the danger of retaining such an attitude. Perhaps his peculiar nature was unequal to the continuous effort the position called for. In a moment he seemed to shrink before those straight gazing eyes, and the light of purpose behind them. When he finally spoke a curious, almost pleading tone blended with the genuine horror in his words.
"No, no, Effie, you can't—you daren't!" he cried passionately. "Do you know what you're doing? Do you know what that reward means to you—to us? Look at your hands. They're clean, and soft, and white. Say, girl, that's blood money, blood money that'll surely stain them with a crimson you'll never wash off 'em all your life. It's blood money. Man's blood. Human blood. Just the same as runs through our veins. Oh, say, girl, I've no sort of use for rustlers. They're crooks, and maybe murderers. Guess they're everything you can think of, and a sight more. But they're men, and their blood's hot, warm blood the same as yours and mine. And you reckon to chaffer that blood for a price. You're going to sell it—for a price. You're going to do more. Yes. You're going to wreck a woman's conscience for life for those filthy, blood-soaked dollars. The price? Effie, things are mighty hard with us. Maybe they're harder with you than me. But I just can't believe we've dropped so low we can sell the life blood of even a—murderer. I can't believe it. I just can't. That's all. Tell 'em, Effie. Tell 'em all you know and have discovered if you will. Tell 'em in the cause of justice. But barter your soul and conscience for filthy blood money—I—bah! It makes me turn sick to think that way."
But Effie was in no mood to listen to the dictates of squeamish principles from a man who lacked the spirit and power—the will to raise her out of the mire of penury into which he had helped to plunge her. The hours of dreary, hopeless labor; the weeks and months of dismal and grinding poverty had sunk deeply into her soul. No price was too high to pay to escape these things. In a moment her reply was pouring forth in a passionate torrent.
"Blood money?" she cried. "Bob, you're crazier than I'd have thought. Where's the difference? I mean between handin' these folks over to justice for justice sake, and taking the reward the folks who're most to benefit by it are ready to hand out to me? Say, you can't talk that way, Bob. You can't just do it. Aren't the folks who carry out the justice in the land paid for it—from the biggest judge to the fellow who handles the levers of the electric chair? Doesn't the country hand out thousands of dollars every year for the punishment of offenders, whether it's for the shedding of their life blood, or merely their heart's blood in the cruel horrors of a penitentiary? Do you think I'm going to hand out my secret to a bunch of cattlemen for their benefit and profit, and reap no comfort from it for myself in the miserable life I'm condemned to endure? Your scruples are just crazy. They're worse. They're selfish. You'd rather see me drudging all the best moments of my life away, so you can lounge around Ju Penrose's saloon spending dollars you've no right to, than risk your peace of mind on an honest—yes,honest—transaction that's going to give me a little of the comfort that you haven't the grit to help me to yourself."
The girl was carried away with the force of her own purpose and craving. Every word she said was meant from the bottom of her soul. There was not a shadow of yielding. She had no illusions. For two years her heart had been hardening to its present condition, and she would not give up one tittle of the chance that now opened out before her hungry eyes.
Bob was clay in her hands. He was clay in any hands sufficiently dominating. He knew from the moment he had delivered his appeal, and he had heard only the tones of her reply, that it was he who must yield or complete irrevocably the barrier which had been steadily growing up between them. Just for a moment the weakly, obstinate thought had occurred of flinging everything to the winds and of denying her once more with all the force at his command. But the moment passed. It fled before the charm of her presence, and the memory of the loved which he was incapable of shutting out of his heart. He knew he was right, and she was utterly wrong. But he knew, equally well, from her words and attitude, that it was he who must give way, or——
He shook his head with a negative movement which Effie was quick enough to realize meant yielding. She wanted him to yield. It would simplify all her purpose. She desired that he should participate in the transaction.
"You'll regret it, Effie," he said, in his usual easy tones. "You'll regret it so you'll hate to think of this moment all the rest of your life. It's not you talking, my dear, it's just—the experience you've had to go through. Can't you see? You've never been like this before. And it isn't you. Say, I'd give my right hand it you'd quit the whole thing."
But the girl's resolution was unwavering.
"You—still refuse—to countenance it?" she demanded.
Again Bob shook his head. But now he moved away and struck a match to relight his pipe.
"No," he said. Then he slowly puffed out great clouds of smoke. "No, my dear, if you're bent on it." Then he moved to the cook-stove and supported one foot upon it.
"Say—you guess I'm selfish. You guess I haven't acted as I ought to help push our boat along. You reckon I've become a sort of saloon-loafing bum. Guess you sort of think I'm just about the limit. Well, maybe I'm nothing to shriek about. However, I've told you all I feel. I've told you what you're going to feel—later. Meanwhile it's up to me to help you all I know. Tell me the whole thing, and I'll do the business for you. I'll see Dug McFarlane for you, and fix things. But it's on one condition."
"What is it?"
Something of the coldness had passed from the girl's eyes. She was smiling because she had achieved her purpose.
"Why—just this. That I don't touch one single dollar of the price you're to receive for those poor devils' blood. That's all."
Just for a moment a dull flush surged up under the tan of the girl's cheeks, and her eyes sparkled ominously. Then she returned to her rocker with great deliberation.
"You're crazy, Bob," she said frigidly, but without any other display."Still—just sit around, and—I'll tell you it all."
And while the man listened to the story of his wife's adventures his mind went back to the scene in Ju Penrose's saloon, and the denial he had flung so heatedly at that philosophic cynic.
Dug McFarlane was a picturesque creature. He was big in height and girth. He was also big in mind. And, which was much more important to the people of the Orrville ranching world, big in purse. He was grizzled and gray, and his eyes beamed out of a setting which was surely made for such beaming; a setting which possessed no sharp angles or disfiguring hollows, but only the healthy tissue of a well-nourished and wholesome-living man in middle life.
As he sat his horse, beside his station foreman, gazing out at the broken line of foothills which marked the approach to the barrier of mountains cutting against the blue, he seemed to display in his bearing something of that dominating personality which few successful men are entirely without. All about them lay the heavy-railed corrals of a distant out-station. Just behind stood the rough shanty, which was the bunkhouse for the cowhands employed in this region. The doctor was still within, tending the grievously injured man who had been so badly wounded in the previous night's raid by the rustlers.
For the time Dug's beaming eyes were shadowed with a concern that was half angry and wholly depressed. They searched the rolling grass-land until the distance was swallowed up by the barrier of hills. He was seeking one reassuring glimpse of the black, hornless herd whose pastures these were. But only disappointment met him on every side. The beautiful, sleek, Aberdeen-Angus herd, which was his joy and pride, had vanished. They had gone, he knew. They had gone the same way that, during the last five years, hundreds of head of his stock had gone. It was the last straw.
"Say, Lew Hank," he said, in a voice of something approaching an emotion he possessed no other means of displaying, "it's beat me bad. It's beat me so bad I don't seem able to think right. We'd a hundred head running on this station. As fine a bunch as ever were bred from the old country's strain. I just feel that mad I could set right in to break things."
Then, after a long pause during which the station foreman waited silent:
"And only last night, while these guys was raising the mischief right here, I was setting around doping out big talk, and raising a mighty big wad for the round-up of the whole darnation gang. Can you beat it? I'm sore. Sore as hell. Say, tell it me again. I don't seem to have it clear."
He passed one great muscular hand across his moist forehead, and the gesture was rather one of helplessness.
Lew Hank regarded him with measuring eyes. He knew him so well. In the ten years and more he had worked for him he had studied his every mood. This phase in the great cattleman's character was something new, something rather startling. Dug's way was usually volcanic. It was hot and fierce for a while, generally to hollowed by a hearty laugh, rather like the passing of a summer storm. But this, in Lew's opinion, was a display of weakness. A sign he neither liked nor respected. The truth was Dug McFarlane had been hit in a direction of which his subordinate had no understanding. That herd of Aberdeen-Angus cattle had been his plaything. His hobby. He had been devoted to it in a way that would have been absurd to any one but a cattleman. Hank decided this unaccustomed weakness must be nipped in the bud.
"Say, boss, it ain't no use in squealin'," he grumbled, in the hard tones of a man who yields to no feelings of sympathy. His weather-stained face was set and ugly in its expression. "Wher's the use in it anyway?" he demanded. "Get a look around. There's miles of territory, an' all of it runs into them blamed hills. I got three boys with me. They're right boys, too. I don't guess there's a thing you or me could tell 'em 'bout their work. Not a thing. Day and night one of 'em's on grazin' guard. Them beasties ain't never left to trail off into the hills. Wal, I guess that's all we ken do—sure. Say, you can't hold up a gang of ten an' more toughs with a single gun in the dead, o' night, 'specially with a hole in your guts same as young Syme's had bored into his. I ain't ast once, nor twice, to hev them beasties run into the corrals o' nights, and fed hay, same as in winter. I've ast it fifty times. It's bin up to you, boss. So I say it's no use in squealin'."
Hank spat over his horse's shoulder, and his thin lips closed with a snap. He was a lean forceful prairieman who possessed, as he would himself have said, no parlor tricks. Dug McFarlane, for all his wealth, for all he had been elected president of the Western Union Cattle Breeders' Association three years in succession, was no more to him than any other employer who paid wages for work loyally performed.
Dug regarded his foreman with close attention. He ignored the man's rough manner. But, nevertheless, it was not without effect.
"And the other boys?"
"Was dead asleep in the bunkhouse—same as me. What 'ud you have?They ain't sheep dogs."
Dug took no umbrage.
"And they're out on the trail—right now?"
"Sure. Same as we should be, 'stead o' wastin' hot air around here. Say, I guess you're feelin' sore. But I don't guess your feelin's is a circumstance to mine, boss. You ain't bin beat to your face by this lousy gang. I have. An' say, I'm yearnin'—jest gaspin'—to wipe out the score. I don't sort o' care a bit for your loss. That ain't my funeral. But they've beat me plumb out—same as if I was some sucker who ain't never roped an' branded a three-year-old steer since I was pupped. Are you comin' along? They struck out northwest. We got that, an' the boys is follerin' hard on their trail. It'll be better'n squealin' around here."
There could be no doubt about the man's feelings. They were displayed in every word he spoke. In every glance of his fierce eyes. Dug approved him. His manners were nothing. Lew was probably the most capable cattleman in his service.
He was about to follow his foreman who had swung his horse about to set off northward, when he abruptly flung out an arm, pointing.
"That one of your boys—coming in? Maybe——"
Lew screwed up his eyes in the sunlight. His rep came in a moment.
"Maybe—nuthin'. That ain't one of my boys." Then, after a brief, considering pause, in which he narrowly examined the distant horseman's outfit: "Sort o' rec'nize him, too. Likely he's that bum guy with the dandy wife way up on Butte Creek. Whitstone, ain't it? Feller with swell folks way down east, an' who guesses the on'y sort o' farmin' worth a cuss is done in Ju Penrose's saloon. That's him sure," he added, as the man drew nearer. Then he went on musingly. "I guess he's got a lot to dope out. Say, them guys must have passed near by his shanty."
Bob Whitstone reined his pony up with a jerk. He was on a mission that inspired no other emotion than that of repulsion and self-loathing. And these things found reflection in his good-looking face.
He glanced swiftly from one to the other as he confronted the burly rancher and his station foreman. The latter he did not know, nor was he interested in him. The man he had come to see was Dug McFarlane, who claimed from him, as he did from every man in the district, something in the nature of respect.
"Guess you'll remember me, sir," he began, in his easy, refined tones. "My name is Whitstone—Bob Whitstone. You granted me certain grazing rights awhile back. It was some two years ago. Maybe you'll remember. You did it to help me out. Anyway, I came over to see you this morning because—I must. If you can spare half an hour I want to see you privately. It's—important. You've been robbed last night, and—it's about them. The gang, I mean."
His pony was still blowing. Bob had ridden hard. He had first ridden into Orrville, and then followed the rancher out here. He was leaning over in the saddle lounging upon the horn of it. His eyes were gazing curiously, speculatively at the figure of the man who ruled the local cattle industry. He was calculating in his own way what might be the effect of the news he had to impart. What estimate this big man—and Bob knew him to be a big man—would have of him when he had told his news and claimed the—blood money? With each moment he shrank smaller and smaller in his own estimation.
Dug regarded him steadily.
"You've got news of them?"
Bob nodded, and glanced meaningly in the direction of Lew Hank.
"I've seen 'em. But—it's more than that."
The rancher turned quickly upon his foreman.
"Say, just get along into the shack there, and see how the Doc's making with young Syme. I need a talk with Whitstone."
It was not without obvious and resentful reluctance that Lew Hank withdrew. Even his hardihood, however, was unequal to resisting so direct an order from his chief.
The two men watched him out of earshot. Then Dug, with almost precipitate haste, turned back to his visitor.
"Now, sir, I'm ready to hear anything you need to tell me."
But Bob was thinking of Ju Penrose as he had thought of him many times since he had listened and yielded to Effie's appeal. Every man has his price. Bob knew now that he, like the rest, had his price. That price a woman had set for him. Ju was right—hatefully right. Well, he would now refuse to be robbed of one cent of it.
He looked up sharply as the other made his demand.
"You're offering ten thousand dollars reward for the| capture of theLightfoot gang, Mr. McFarlane?"
"That's so."
The rancher's regard had deepened. There was a curious light shining in his blue eyes. It was half speculative, half suggestive of growing excitement. It was wholly full of a burning interest.
"Say, I'd just like to know how I stand." Bob laughed that short hard laugh which bears no trace of mirth. "You see, I can put you wise. I can lead you right on to their camp so you can get 'em—while they're sleeping, or any other old way. Oh, yes, I'm ready to play my part right up to the limit. It don't matter a thing. I'm not just here to tell you about things. I'm here to lead you to that camp, and take a hand in the hanging when you get busy. You see, I'm a whole hogger. But I want to know how things stand about that ten thousand dollar reward. Do I get it? If I get shot up does my wife get it? And when it's paid, do you shout about it? Does the gang down Orrville way need to know who it was they forgot to hand the name of Judas to when he was christened? I don't care a cuss on my own account. It's——"
But Dug McFarlane broke in upon the bitter raillery. He had no thought for the man or his feelings, just for one moment it seemed to him that some sort of miracle had happened. And his every thought and feeling was absorbed in it. Here, after five years of vain effort, here, after five years of depredations which had almost threatened the cattle industry in the district with complete crippling, here was a man who could lead them to the raiders' hiding-place, could show them how the hanging they all so cordially desired could be brought about. It was stupendous. It was—yes, it was miraculous.
His first impulse had been to give way to the excitement which stirred him, but he restrained himself.
"Ten thousand dollars will be paid by me to the man, or his nominee, privately, if his information leads to the hanging of this gang. Say, boy, we ain't goin' to split hairs or play any low games on this lay out. I'm a rich man, an' ten thousand dollars ain't a circumstance so we break up this gang. If we only get one of 'em or part of 'em, the man who shows me their hiding-place, and leads me to it, that man—or his wife—gets my ten thousand dollars. You can have it in writing. But my word goes any old time. Now you can get busy and hand me the proposition."
The steady eyes, the emphatic tones of this big, straight-dealing rancher silenced the last doubt in Bob's lesser mind. He was out to do this dirty work with all his might in the interest of the woman who had inspired it. But he had scarcely been prepared for such simple methods as this man displayed. He had felt that it was for him to barter, to scheme, to secure the dollars Effie coveted. A deep sigh escaped him. It may have been relief. It may have been of regret that he must stand before so straight-dealing a personality claiming his thirty pieces of silver.
He passed one hand across his perspiring brow and thrust his prairie hat farther back upon his head. He would have preferred, however, to have drawn it down over his eyes to escape the searching gaze from the honest depths of the other's. Suddenly, with a gesture of impatience, he began to talk rapidly.
"It's no use, Mr. McFarlane, I hate this rotten work," he cried out. "I—I hate it so bad I could just rather bite my tongue out than tell you the things I've got to. It's rotten. I don't know—— Say, you don't know me, and I don't guess you care a curse anyway. But I was brought up in a city and taught to believe things were a deal better than I've lately come to think they are. Psha! These fellers have got to be hanged when and where we get them. But it hurts me bad to think that I've got to take dollars for handing you their lives. Oh, that don't tell you a thing either. You'd say I don't need to take 'em. But I do. I got to take those dollars, if they blister my hands and burn the bones inside 'em. I've got to have 'em, and I'd like to burn 'em, every blazing one. But I've got to have 'em. Say, I'll be paid on the nail when the job's done? If I get shot up the money'll be paid to my wife? Will you give me your word, sir? Your word of honor?"
"My word of honor."
"Say, then come right back with me to my shanty no, best not. We'll ride back to Orrville, and I'll hand you all I know as we go. I can quit you before we reach the township. Then you can hustle the crowd together and I'll be waiting ready at my shack to play my part—the dirty rotten Judas racket."
"Judas betrayed his—Master and Friend. Are these people your friends?Is Lightfoot your master?"
"Heavens! What d'you take me for—a rustler?"
"Then quit your crazy talk of Judas. Your duty's plumb clear. Your duty's to hand these folks, these bandits, into our hands. The money's a matter of—choice. I'll just hand my man a word or two, and we'll get back Orrville way."
* * * * * *
It was past midnight when Bob took up a position squatting on the sill of his own doorway. Standing close behind him, leaning against the rough casing, Effie looked down upon his huddled figure. Her eyes were alight with a power of suppressed excitement. The blood was surging through her young veins, and every nerve was tense with the strain of waiting, of anticipation.
But her emotions were by no means shared by her husband. For all her beauty and woman's charm she was different, utterly different from him. She had been brought up to the understanding that she would have to make her own way in the world. All her parents had been able to do for her was to see that she was as fully equipped for the adventure of life as their limited means would permit. Those means would die when her chief parent died, and the style in which they had lived left no margin for saving.
So, with cool calculation, Effie had set about her life's effort. Nor had she considered herself unsuccessful in the first spreading of her maiden wings. A millionaire's son! It was a splendid match. It had met with the entire approval of her family.
Then had come disillusionment. A determined opposition from Bob's father. She had been urged to break off the engagement. She even intended to do so. But some how she had miscalculated the nature which her education had been powerless to eradicate. She realized at last when the demands of her campaign made themselves heard, that there was something she had hitherto completely ignored. There was the woman's heart of her. She had most absurdly fallen in love with this first stepping-stone toward the goal of her ambition. It was the absurd uncalculating love of extreme youth. But it was sufficiently impetuous to flout all the reason which her training and upbringing had been calculated to inspire her with.
The rest followed in natural sequence, and now, after two years of married penury, she was ready to seize any straw which chance flung in her way as a means of salving that ambition which she now saw, with more perfectly clear vision, was completely upon the rocks.
Now, in her mind, there were only three matters of concern. Would DugMcFarlane come? Would they succeed in capturing this Lightfoot gang?Would she get those ten thousand dollars, which appeared so vast a sumto eyes only accustomed to dwelling upon cents?
Bob was silent. His whole aspect seemed to have undergone a complete changes. He had returned to her with the story of his interview with Dug McFarlane. He had returned to her with the assurance that he had sold his conscience, his honor, at her bidding, and he hoped she was satisfied. Since then he had wrapped himself in a moody silence which had defied her utmost effort to break down.
The horses stood ready saddled in the barn. Effie was clad in her riding suit. As yet the moon had not risen to reduce the starlit magnificence of the velvet summer night sky. Nor was there any sound to warn them that the hours of suspense were nearly over.
Finally, Effie could endure the silence no longer. Her dark eyes were intently gazing down upon the bowed figure of the man. They were hard with every bitter woman's emotion. She was full of a fierce, hot resentment against the man who could so obstinately resist the spirit of her longing.
"Bob," she cried at last, all restraint completely giving way, "do you know what I could do just now more willingly than anything else in the world? I could thrust out my foot and spurn you with it as you might any surly cur which barred your way. I tell you I'm hot with every feeling of contempt for your crazy attitude. You dare to set yourself and your moral scruples between my welfare and the miserable life you've condemned me to. Your moral scruples. Were there ever such things? Morals? Ju Penrose's saloon day and night—for you. The sluttish drudgery of this wretched place for me. Then you dare to place your conscience before my—comfort."
"Do I?"
The man did not look up. His brooding eyes were on the sky-line to the southeast.
"I've done as you needed. I've arranged everything with the—hangman. You're going to touch those pleasant dollars. What more are you asking me?"
"What more? Yes, you've done these things because I've driven you to them. You? You'd rather see me sitting around here starving, a worn wreck of a woman, than lend a willing hand to bettering our lot. Oh, yes, you've done these things, and—I hate you for the way you've done them."
The man sat up. He shifted his position so that he could gaze up at the splendid creature standing over him.
"You don't hate me worse than I hate myself, Effie," he said with an exasperating lack of emotion. "Say, you feel like kicking me. You feel like treating me like a surly cur. Well, I guess you're welcome. I don't guess there's a thing you can do that way can hurt me worse than you've done already." Then he smiled. And his smile was more maddening to the woman than his words. "Don't worry a thing. You're going to get your dollars if there's anything I can do to help you, and when you've got 'em—why, if the merciful God we've both been brought up to believe in is all we believe Him, I shan't be around to watch you dirtying your hands with them."
Then with a swift, alert movement he raised a warning hand.
"H'sh!"
For some seconds they remained listening. Far away to the southeast a low murmuring note came over the low hills. The girl remained with eyes straining to pierce the starlit monotone. The man rose slowly from his seat. Finally he turned about and faced her, and his eyes smiled into hers.
"The hanging bee," he said.
It was the gap where the screen of bush broke off, leaving the barren shoulder overlooking the valley. It was where the hard-beaten, converging cattle-paths hurled themselves over the brink to the wide depths below.
The stillness that prevailed was unbroken by a single night sound. Even the insect life seemed wrapped in a deep hush of somnolence. As yet the night scavengers had not emerged from their hidings to bay the silvery radiance of a moonlit night. The deep hush beneath the myriad of eyes of night was as beautiful as it was treacherous, for it only cloaked hot, stirring passions ready in a moment to break out into warring chaos.
Crouching low under the shelter of the screening bush three figures huddled closely. They were peering across the wide gulf, searching with eyes that only half read what lay before them in the starlight. Their gaze rested upon one definite spot whose shadowy outline was indicated by the outstretched arm of one of the party. It was a deep woodland bluff, leaning, as it seemed, for support against the far wall of the valley's western slope.
After some tense moments the straining eyes beheld the faintest glimmer of artificial light flickering in the depths of its silent heart. So faint was it, at the distance, that, for a while, doubt prevailed. Then conviction supervened as each of the watchers recorded his observation and a sigh of certitude made itself heard. The point of light was held by all. It was dwelt upon. It was the verification needed to convey absolute faith in the woman's tale miraculous.
Perhaps it was the light in some window of a secret abode. Perhaps it was the steady flicker of an unscreened camp-fire. Perhaps, even, it was the beam of some lantern carelessly set down and left alight. Whatever it was it was certainly of human agency, and human agency in these regions had only one interpretation for the minds of those who were watching from the high eastern wall of the valley.
Presently a woman's voice spoke in the hush of suppressed excitement. Her tone was full of an eagerness that hurled her words swiftly upon the still night air.
"That's where I marked them down," she whispered. "There—just there. Right where that light's shining. Somewhere in the heart of that bluff. There was a herd grazing out in front, with three mounted men guarding it. There's no mistake. It's a bee-line right across. And the men who fired up this way came out of those trees. It's steep down these paths. They sort of zigzag their way, but it's a path any horse can make without danger. It just needs care. Once in the valley it's a stretch of sweet-grass without a bluff or a break of any sort. There's no slough either. It's just grass. One big flat of sweet-grass."
There was no reply from her companions. They were engrossed with the object of their straining scrutiny. Presently the woman went on again.
"This is where my work quits," she said. Then she withdrew her gaze and looked up at the dim outline of the big man nearest her. There was just a shade of eagerness in her manner now. "That's Lightfoot's camp, Mr. McFarlane," she assured. "I've done all that's needed. You see, I'm a woman, and I don't guess you need anything more from me. Shall I stop right here, or—get back to home?"
Bob Whitstone was watching his wife closely as she addressed herself to the rancher. He noted her tone, her evident anxiety now, and he understood. A curious repulsion surged through him. In the brief two years of his married life no such sensation had ever possessed him. But he recognized it. It was the breaking point. Effie no longer held place in his affections. He glanced up at McFarlane as his deep tones whispered in the silence.
"Yes, ma'am, get right back to home. There's no need for you to get mussed up with what's goin' to happen. It's man's work, not a woman's. Your husband's got my word. You'll find we aren't forgetful."
Then he drew back under cover, and moved away to where, scattered along the path, well sheltered from view, a large party of dismounted horsemen were awaiting his orders.
Effie turned to her husband.
"You're coming back with me, Bob?" she said, almost pleadingly. "It's a long way to home."
Bob's eyes gazed straight into hers. Even in the darkness Effie felt something of the coldness of his regard.
"Are you scared?" he demanded.
Effie shook her head.
"There's nothing to be scared at. But you've nothing to do with—the rest of it."
"Haven't I?"
"You're not going down there with them?"
There was a curious sharpness in the woman's whispering voice. Bob's cold regard remained unwavering.
"I'm leaving nothing to chance. You've got to get your wages. I'm going to see you get them. Yes, I'm going—down there."
A sudden fierce passion swept through the woman's heart. Hot words in retort surged to her lips. But they remained unuttered. A strong effort of restraint checked them. She turned away coldly, her eyes focussing once more upon the tiny point of light across the hollow.
"Guess you must do as you think," she said, with a shrug. And she remained with her back turned upon the man she was destined never to address again.
Bob moved away and joined the rest of the Vigilantes. They were already in the saddle. Dug McFarlane had given his final orders. In a moment Bob surveyed the scene in the dim light. Then he turned away to his own horse and sprang into the saddle.
McFarlane saw him and rode up.
"You coming along?" he enquired curiously.
"Sure."
"Good boy." Then he drew a deep breath. "Maybe there'll be an empty saddle or two before we've done. But I don't guess that'll need to worry us any. The man who 'passes in' to-night won't have any kick comin'. It's better that way—with your duty done."
"Yes."
The simple monosyllable was strangely expressive, but Dug McFarlane had no understanding of the thought that prompted it. It would have been difficult indeed, even with understanding, to have probed the depths of feeling prompting it. But Whitstone was incapable of seeing the broader aspect of anything pertaining to himself. He saw only as his feelings dictated, without logic or reason of any sort. He was of that nature which leans for support upon prejudices absorbed in early youth. Principles inculcated through early environment and teaching. He was incapable of testing or questioning their verity. Robbed of them he was left floundering. And Effie, the woman whom he had married only out of hot, youthful human regard, had so robbed him.
Effie drew back. She pressed herself close into the bush as the cavalcade sought the path at the edge of the valley. She watched the burly leader vanish over the brink. Then, one by one, twenty-five others passed her in review, and were swallowed up by the depths below. She knew none of them personally, but she knew they were all ranchers and ranchmen of varying degree. She knew that each individual had at some time suffered at the hands of the rustlers. That deep in each heart was the craving for a vengeance which possessed small enough thought of justice in it. These men were Vigilantes. They were so called not from any desire to enforce law and order, but purely for their own self-defense, the defending of self-interests.
They impressed her not from any justice of motive, but from the merciless purpose upon which they were bent.
The last to pass over the brink was her husband, a slight figure, almost puny, amongst these hard prairie folk. Just for one weak moment she was on the point of raising a protesting voice. Just for one moment a womanly softening held her yielding. He was her husband, and memories crowded. But almost as they were born they died. Their place was once more taken by the recollection of the life she had been forced to endure for the sake of her first youthful passion. Her heart hardened. No impulse had driven her to her present actions. They were the result of a craving she was powerless to resist. Her husband must go his way. He must act as he saw fit. For herself she would not forego one tithe of the reward which she believed would help her to that comfort in life for which her soul yearned.
With the passing of the Vigilantes she moved clear of the bush. She would see this out. Home? She had no desire for her home. The night had no terrors for her. Nothing had terror for her, except the failure of these men.
She flung herself upon the ground and lay with wide eyes searching the remoteness of the valley beyond. Her impatience had developed into something almost feverish. She wanted a sign. She wanted assurance. But the world seemed so still, so entirely peaceful.
The moments pursued for her a sluggish course. The jeweled sky was an added regret. She desired light, light that she might witness the whole drama she hoped—yes, hoped—would be played out down there in the valley. A sort of dementia had taken possession of her. She had no thought of the blood to be poured out at her bidding. She thought nothing of the strong lives to be given up in sacrifice for her well-being. She thought only of herself, and all that the success of that night's affairs would mean to her.
But the dragging minutes extending upward of half an hour wore her fever down. And slowly depression replaced her more tense emotions. It all seemed so long in happening that failure began to loom, and to become a certainty.
It was too good to hope. Ten thousand dollars! The amount bulked in her mind. It grew greater and greater in its significance as delay thrust hope further and further from her thought. Again impatience grew, hot, angry impatience, and drove depression out. What were they doing down there? Why did they not surround the bluff? There were enough of them. Look! The light was still shining. It was the camp. Where that light shone the men lay in hiding. Well—it was simple. To her mind there was no need for——
The sound of a rifle shot split the air with significant abruptness. The sound banished the last of her half-angry causing. The moment had come. She raised herself up for no other reason than tense drawn suspense.
A second shot. Then a rattle of musketry which suggested general conflict. She drew a deep breath. Far away in the distance it seemed she heard a sharp cry. It was the final shriek of a human creature in the agony of a mortal wound. Then followed the sound of hoarse voices shouting.
For some moments nothing in the scene changed. The speck of light shone out twinkling and gleaming like some evil eye. For the rest—there remained the deep twilight marked by the myriads of summer stars.
But the cries of men, the trampling of speeding hoofs held her. The breathlessness of the whole thing was upon her now, making it impossible to detach her regard from the main features.
The rattle of rifles had become almost incessant. And a few moments later a blaze of light shot up from the far side of the bluff. It grew, licking up the great, sun-dried, resinous pine wood with paralyzing rapidity. Another great sheet of flame soared upward further away to the right. Then another to the south. A fire trap had been set at the far side of the great bluff, and only the hither side remained open to those seeking shelter within it.
Effie's gaze was fascinated beyond her control. The Vigilantes had planned their coup deliberately and well. The air she was breathing began to reek with the pungent smell of burning. A light smoke haze began to flood the picture. Now she beheld moving figures in the lurid glow which backed the scene. They were horsemen. But whether or not they were the Vigilantes she could not be certain. They were racing across the open, and the crack of their rifles mingled with the spluttering crackle of the conflagration beyond.
Never for one moment did the woman withdraw her gaze. The spell of it all was almost painful. She knew that life and death were at grips down there in that cauldron of conflict. And though at moments shudders passed through her body, they were neither shudders of weakness nor womanish horror. Her only emotion was excitement, and her nerves were ready to respond in physical expression to every vision her eyes communicated to them.
An hour passed thus. The bluff was a furnace, roaring, booming. It lit the valley seemingly from end to end. The night shadows had been swept aside, and the scene lay spread out before her eyes. She saw dismounted riders moving about. She beheld one group; a number of men huddled together, held as though they were prisoners.
At last firing altogether ceased and the straggling horsemen began to reassemble in the vicinity of the chief group. Then, as the raging fire ate its way through to the hither side of the bluff, and turned the final barrier into a wall of fire, the whole party moved away down the valley with obvious signs of haste.
Effie gazed after them with widening eyes while the hot breath of the conflagration fanned her cheeks. She was wondering, speculating, and slowly the significance of their movements began to take hold of her.
At first she had thought that the movement was inspired by the overpowering heat of the forest fire. She had warned herself of the danger. The grass down there. The flying sparks. But almost in the same breath she realized that there was more, far more in that movement. The grass was far too green in the valley to form any real danger and the bluff was sufficiently isolated. No, there was more in it than the danger of fire.
She shivered, although the night air now possessed something of the temperature of a summer noon. All her excitement had passed. She had even forgotten for the time all that the doings of that night meant to her. She was thinking of the deliberate administration of justice as these men understood it. It was crude, deadly, and full of a painful horror, and now, now, in saner moments, she beheld the dawn of emotions which had come all too late. Whither were those men riding? Whither? And then? Ah—she shuddered, and her shudder was full of realization. For well she knew that the men she had seen grouped were living prisoners. Living prisoners. How long would they remain so? What would be their end?
The noon sun sweltered down through the rank vegetation of the narrow defile. The heat was almost too burdensome to endure. It was moist; it was dank with the reek of decaying matter. The way was a seemingly endless battle against odds. But the travelers were buoyed with the knowledge that it was a short cut, calculated to save them many hours and many miles.
Bud Tristram had pointed the way. Furthermore, he had urged Jeff to accept and endure the tortures and shortcomings which he knew they must face in the heart of this remote gulch.
Nor were his warnings unneeded, for Nature had set up no inconsiderable defenses. Here were swarms of over-grown mosquitoes of a peculiarly vicious type, which covered their horses' flanks in a gray horde, almost obliterating their original colors; and a bleeding mass resulted every time either man raised a hand to the back of his own neck to soothe the fierce irritation of the vicious attacks. Then the way itself. It was a narrow gorge almost completely occupied by the muddy bed and boggy shores of a drying mountain creek.
It was, in Jeff's own words, a "fierce journey." The heat left them drenched in perspiration, and wiltering. The two packhorses fought for their very lives, often hock deep in a sucking mire. While the beasts, who bore the burden of their exacting masters, were driven to battle every inch of the way against a fiercely obstinate rampart of dense grown bush.
Mercifully the gorge was less than three miles in length. A greater distance must have left the nervous equine mind staggered, and helpless, and beaten. As it was nearly three hours of incessant struggle only served to pass the final barrier.
"Phew!"
Jeff Masters drew off his hat as they emerged upon the wide opening of a great valley. Then he flung himself out of the saddle and began to sweep the blood-inflated mosquitoes from his horse's flanks. Bud, with less haste, proceeded to do the same. Finally, both men walked round the weary beasts and examined the security of the packs on the led horses.
Bud pointed down the valley with one outstretched arm.
"We'll make that way," he said, his deep eyes dwelling almost affectionately upon the wide stretch of blue-tinted grass. "Guess we'll take the high land an' camp fer food."
Then he turned back to his horse and remounted. Jeff silently followed his example and they rode on.
For many minutes no word passed between them. Each was busy with his own particular thoughts. The deep look of friendly affection was still in Bud's eyes. Jeff was far less concerned with the wonderful scene slowly unfolding itself as they proceeded than with the purpose of his journey. He knew they had reached the central point from which they were to radiate their search of the labyrinth of hills. His mind was upon the wealth of possibility before them. The difficulties. Bud, for the time at least, was concerned only with that which his eyes beheld, and the memories of other days far, far back when he had possessed no greater responsibility than the quest of adventure, and his own safe delivery from the fruits of his unwisdom.
It was he who first broke the silence between them.
"Gee!" he exclaimed, with that curious note of appreciation which that ejaculation can assume. "It's big. Say, Jeff, it's big an' good to look on. Sort of makes you think, too, don't it? Jest get a peek that way. Them slopes." He indicated the western boundary of the valley rising up, up to great pine-crested heights. "A thousand—two thousand feet. And hills beyond. Big hills, with snows you couldn't melt anyhow. Over there, too." One great hand waved in the direction of the east. "Lesser hills. Lesser woods. But—man, it's fine! Then ahead. Miles an' miles of this queer blue grass which sets fat on cattle inches deep."
His words ceased, but his eyes continued to feast, flooding the simple brain behind them with a joy which no words could describe. Presently he went on:
"Makes you feel A'mighty God's a pretty big feller, don't it? Guess He jest tumbles things around, an' sets up, an' levels down in a way that wouldn't mean a thing to brains like ours—till He's finished it all, and sort of swep' up tidy. Look at them colors, way up there to the west. Queer? Sure. Every sort o' blamed color in a tangle no earthly painter could set out. Ain't it a pictur'? It's jest a sort o' pictur' a painter feller's li'ble to spend most of his wholesome nights dreamin' about. An' when he wakes up, why, I don't guess he kin even think like it, an' he sure ain't a hell of a chance to paint that way anyhow. Say, d'you make it these things are, or is it jest something He sets in us makes us see 'em that way? He's big—He surely is. I'm glad I come along with you, Jeff, boy. Y' see, a feller sort o' sits around home, an' sees the same grass, an' brands the same steers, an' thinks the same thinks. Ther' ain't nothin' he don't know around home. He gets so life don't seem a thing, an' he jest feels he's running things so as he pleases. He sort o' fergets he's jest a part o' the scenery around. He fergets he's set in that scenery by an A'mighty big Hand, same as them all-fired m'squitters we just found, an' kind o' guesses he is that A'mighty Hand." He turned his deeply smiling eyes on his companion. "I don't often take on like this, Jeff," he apologized, "but the sight o' this place makes me want to shout an' get right out an' thank the good God He's seen fit to let me sit around an' live."
But Jeff had no means of simple expression such as Bud. He could never give verbal expression to the emotions locked away in his heart. Those who knew him regarded it as reserve, even hardness. Perhaps it was only that shyness which the strongest characters are often most prone to.
He ignored the older man's quaintly expressed feelings, and fastened upon the opening he had at last received, and which he had been seeking ever since it had become obvious that Bud's knowledge of the great Cathill range was almost phenomenal.
"You know these parts a heap," he observed.
"Know 'em?" Bud laughed in his deep-throated way, which was only another indication of his buoyant mood. "You'd know 'em, boy, if you'd had a father build up a big pelt trading post right in this valley, an' fer sixteen years o' your life you'd ridden, an' shot, an' hunted over this blue grass, and these hills, for nigh a range of fifty mile. Guess I know this territory same as you know the playgrounds o' the college that handed you your knowledge o' figgers. Know it? Say, you could dump me right down anywhere around here for fifty miles an' more, an' I'd travel straight here same as the birds fly." He laughed again. "When you said you'd the notion of huntin' out your brother, who was huntin' these hills, you give me the excuse I'd been yearnin' to find in years. I wanted to see these hills again. I wanted it bad. Guess I was jest crazy fer it. It didn't get me figgerin' long, either, to locate wher' we'd likely find that boy you're lookin' fer. Ther' ain't no better huntin' ground than around this valley. It's sort of untouched since my father died, an' I had to quit it and take to punchin' cattle. Then ther's that post he built. A dandy place, with nigh everything a pelt hunter needs fer his comfort. We're making for that post right now, an' when we make it I'm guessin' we ain't goin' to chase much farther to locate that twin brother of yours."
"But you never——"
Bud shook his great head, and stretched his ungainly legs with his stirrups thrust out wide.
"Sure I didn't tell you these things," he nodded, in simple, almost childlike enjoyment.
"I never—— Say, does Nan know you were—raised here?"
"Surely." Then Bud went on with an amused twinkle in his eyes. "But I guess Nan's like me. It ain't our way worryin' other folks with our troubles. You see, most folks ain't a heap o' time to listen to other folks' troubles. Most everybody's jest yearnin' to tell their own."
"Troubles?" Jeff smiled in his own peculiarly shadowy fashion. "You don't seem to figure this valley's any sort of trouble, nor its associations. But maybe there's a bone or two hidden around you don't figure to show me."
Bud remained silent for some moments. Then he gave way to another of his joyous, deep-throated laughs.
"No, sirree! Ther' ain't no troubles to this valley fer me. None. I got memories I wouldn't sell fer a farm. Them wer' days you didn't find trouble in nothin'. No. It's later on you see things diff'rent. Make good, an' you see troubles wher' there shouldn't be none. You an' me we're guessin' to make a pile o' dollars, so we could set up a palace on 5th Av'noo, New York, if we was yearnin' that-a-way. I don't reckon there's many fellers 'ud find trouble in such a play as that. Wal, I'd be willing enough to turn it all down, an' pitch camp right here among these hills, an' chase pelts for the few dollars needed to keep the wind from rattling my bones—'cep' fer Nan."
"Ah yes—Nan. There's Nan to think of. And Nan's more to you, Bud, than anything else in life. Say, your little girl's a bright jewel. I don't need to say a word about her value, eh? But some day you're going to lose her. And then?"
Bud's eyes came round upon him and for some moments encountered Jeff's steady regard. Then he looked away, and slowly all its simple delight dropped from the strong weather-tanned face, to be replaced by an almost painful dejection. Presently he turned again, and, in a moment, Jeff found an added interest in the wonderful scene that lay ahead of him.